scholarly journals Trade and Growth

2021 ◽  
pp. 249-277
Author(s):  
Jakkie Cilliers
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Poverty Reduction ◽  
Regional Cooperation ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Successful Implementation ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Growth Increase ◽  
Trading Partners ◽  
History Of

AbstractCilliers starts by exploring the modern history of international trade and the importance of trade to economic growth and global cooperation. The chapter then provides an overview of Africa’s trading partners, the need for greater regional integration in the continent and the challenges to achieving intra-regional cooperation. It examines the need to improve the quality of governance, bridge the infrastructure deficit and eventually focus on a manufacturing-led growth path. Reducing both tariff and non-tariff barriers could facilitate the successful implementation of African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), induce economic growth, increase per capita incomes and reduce poverty. A penultimate section models the potential impact of the AfCFTA on growth, poverty reduction and increased average incomes.

scholarly journals ASEAN: Regional Integration and Reforms

2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 44-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mari Pangestu ◽  
Lili Yan Ing
Keyword(s):  
Free Trade ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
East Asian ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Trade Agreement ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Trading Partners ◽  
Asian Context ◽  
Asian Integration ◽  
Trade And Investment

Over recent decades ASEAN has advanced a policy of regional integration, starting with the ASEAN Free Trade Area, following on with the ASEAN+1 free trade agreements with its six main trading partners, and now with ASEAN+6. To further advance ASEAN's regional integration in the East Asian context, it should continue to focus on further liberalization of trade in goods, investment, and services that can facilitate more trade and investment. East Asian integration is designed not to be just an “extensive regional trade agreement,” but is more a “responsive vehicle” that consists of trade and investment commitments combined with facilitation. To keep regional integration viable, it should adopt an open regionalism.

Geo-Economic Competition in Latin America: Brazil, Venezuela, and Regional Integration in the 21st Century

2018 ◽  
Vol 33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guilherme Casarões
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
The United States ◽  
Economic Competition ◽  
Integration Model ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Complex Processes ◽  
The Us ◽  
New Institutions

The institutional framework of Latin American integration saw a period of intense transformation in the 2000s, with the death of the ambitious project of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), spearheaded by the United States, and the birth of two new institutions, the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). This article offers a historical reconstruction of regional integration structures in the 2000s, with emphasis on the fault lines between Brazil, Venezuela and the US, and how they have shaped the institutional order across the hemisphere. We argue that the shaping of UNASUR and CELAC, launched respectively in 2007 and 2010, is the outcome of three complex processes: (1) Brazil’s struggle to strengthen Mercosur by acting more decisively as a regional paymaster; (2) Washington’s selective engagement with some key regional players, notably Colombia, and (3) Venezuela’s construction of an alternative integration model through the Bolivarian Alliance (ALBA) and oil diplomacy. If UNASUR corresponded to Brazil’s strategy to neutralize the growing role of Caracas in South America and to break apart the emerging alliance between Venezuela, Argentina, and Bolivia, CELAC was at the same time a means to keep the US away from regional decisions, and to weaken the Caracas-Havana axis that sustained ALBA.

Status and Prospects of Economic Development in East Asia

2014 ◽  
pp. 42-52
Author(s):  
M. Potapov
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
East Asia ◽  
Industrial Development ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Chinese Economy ◽  
Domestic Investment ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Structural Problems ◽  
East Asia Region ◽  
Post Industrial

The East Asia region had survived the global economic crisis of 2008–2009. However, the general slowdown in the region indicates many structural problems. The Chinese economy actively switches to the domestic market, giving priority to domestic investment and consumer demand in the maintenance of the economic growth. The development of integration processes in East Asia leaves open the question of the formation of a region-wide free trade area. East Asia is capable to retain the role of economic growth locomotive, moving towards the level of post-industrial development.

scholarly journals MOVIMIENTOS SOCIALES E INTEGRACIÓN REGIONAL: EL CASO DE LA ARTICULACIÓN DE MOVIMIENTOS SOCIALES HACIA EL ALBA

2013 ◽  
Vol 8 (16) ◽  
pp. 157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karla Díaz Martínez
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Latin America ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Entity ◽  
The Us ◽  
America Latina ◽  
Movimientos Sociales

El ALBA es un espacio de integración regional, alternativo al alca propuesto por EEUU, que inaugura una etapa denominada regionalismo posneoliberal. El ALBA desde sus orígenes ha contado con el acompañamiento de movimientos sociales de carácter antiimperialista y antineoliberal. La propia organización generó una instancia social: el Consejo de Movimientos Sociales; sin embargo, los movimientos sociales han generado de forma paralela y autónoma la Articulación de Movimientos Sociales hacia el ALBA. Este trabajo da cuenta de las características de este espacio de articulación social, a partir de propuestas teóricas pensadas en América Latina, y presenta un balance de las potencialidades y los desafíos de los movimientos sociales en el escenario latinoamericano y su influencia en la integración regional.   SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND REGIONAL INTEGRATION: THE ARTICULATION OF SOCIAL MOVEMENTS TOWARD ALBAABSTRACTALBA (the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our Americas) is a regional integration entity created as an alternative to the US-proposed FTAA (Free Trade Area of the Americas, ALCA in Spanish). ALBA inaugurates a period that has been referred to as post-neoliberal regionalism. Since its origin, ALBA has been accompanied by social movements with an anti-imperialistic and anti-neoliberal stance. ALBA, itself, generated a social entity: the Social Movements Council. However, in a parallel and autonomous way, the social movements created the Articulation of Social Movements toward ALBA. This article describes the characteristics of this entity for social articulation based on theoretical proposals developed in Latin America, and presents a balance of the potentialities and challenges of social movements in Latin America and their incidence in regional integration.

Integration Potential of Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific

2016 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 68-81
Author(s):  
E. Arapova
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
Free Trade ◽  
Economic Integration ◽  
Hybrid Approach ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Hierarchical Cluster ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Asian Regionalism

During the 2014 APEC summit the participating countries agreed to move towards a region-wide economic integration and approved China-backed roadmap to promote the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP). The paper examines prospects for economic integration in the Asia-Pacific in the framework of 21 APEC participating members. It aims to measure the “integration potential” of the FTAAP on the basis of quantitative and qualitative analysis of the actual statistic data, to explore key obstacles hampering economic integration in the region. The research comes from the theory of convergence and concept of proximity. They suppose that the higher is the degree of homogeneity in economic development and regulatory regimes of the integrating countries the higher is their “integration potential”. The objective of the author’s analysis is to measure the “integration potential” of APEC countries in four directions: trade liberalization, free movement of investments, monetary and banking integration, free division of labor. Initial estimates of the FTAAP prospects base on the merchandize trade complementarity indices and coefficients of variation analysis. Besides, the research uses hierarchical cluster analysis that helps to classify countries in different groups according to similarity of their economic typologies. This methodology allows to reveal the favorable algorithm of regional economic integration in the framework of the “hybrid approach” (or “open regionalism” adopted for APEC countries in 1989) which encourages the countries to enter into free trade agreements on a bilateral basis or to make offers to the APEC membership as a whole. Final conclusions are based on the results of authors’ calculations with consideration for contemporary trends of the member countries’ economic development and long-term strategies of economic growth. Acknowledgements. The research was supported by the Russian Fund for Humanities, project no. 15-07-00026 “East Asian regionalism in the context of diversifi cation of economic growth model”.

Towards Macro-Economic Convergence in SACU: The Position of Botswana

2020 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mabutho Shangase
Keyword(s):  
Economic Policy ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Building Blocks ◽  
Customs Union ◽  
Economic Convergence ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Recent Developments

In light of recent developments such as the African Continental African Free Trade Area agreement (AfCFTA), incrementalist approaches to regional inte gration that focus on sub-regions seems to have been pushed to the backburner as more focus puts the entire African continent at the centre of integration processes. With all its potential, gradual macro-economic convergence has accordingly been neglected. Discussions on macro-economic convergence have on the other hand been cast over the broader sub-region such as the Southern African Development Community (SADC) where a number of indicators and targets have been identified and pursued closely. Whilst looking at Botswana as a point of departure, this paper argues that incremental macro-economic convergence is pivotal to broader regional integration and the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) provides an ideal stepping-stone. An incrementalist approach to macro-economic convergence as well as broader regional integration should begin with identifying key formal institutions that serve as custodians of macro-economic policy such as the central banks and departments of finance or treasuries. Using secondary data sources, with Botswana as a case study, this paper foregrounds macro-economic convergence, macro-economic policy making institutions, and SACU as critical building blocks for broader regional integration.

Indonesian Visions of Regionalism: From Yudhoyono to Jokowi

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jürgen Rüland
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Free Trade ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Leadership Frame ◽  
Interpretive Frame ◽  
European Regional

With the “leadership frame,” the chapter unearths a new interpretive frame of the Charter from 2009 onward, suggesting a gradual return of extant ideas of Indonesian foreign policymaking. The chapter also scrutinizes the internalization of the new EU-inspired ideas of regionalism. The litmus tests were events in which the territorial and economic sovereignty of Indonesia was challenged, such as the disputes with Malaysia over maritime borders and the ASEAN-China Free Trade Area. The response to these events showed that most stakeholders except civil society threw overboard many of the liberal-cosmopolitan values associated with European regional integration. Last, the chapter examines whether this ideational reversal continued under the Jokowi government and suggests that the latter did not abruptly break with the foreign policy of his predecessor. Many of the seemingly new Jokowi policies had their roots in the second term of the Yudhoyono presidency.

On the Road to Southern Cone Economic Integration

2000 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Cason
Keyword(s):  
Economic Integration ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Behavior Pattern ◽  
Dominant Role ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Southern Cone ◽  
Integration Process ◽  
The Road ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
On The Road

The integration process as developed in MERCOSUR has been largely a success, albeit led (and often aggravated) by Brazil. Three cases illustrate Brazil’s dominant role: the dispute over the automobile regime that began in 1995, the import-financing conflict of 1997, and the recent negotiations over the Free Trade Area of the Americas. Brazil’s behavior pattern does not threaten MERCOSUR’s stability, however, or the all-but-irreversible progress of regional integration.

Advancing Regional Integration in Africa through the Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA)

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
F. A. Ismail
Keyword(s):  
Trade Liberalization ◽  
Free Trade ◽  
World Bank ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Industrial Development ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
African Union ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
The World Bank ◽  
The World

AbstractThe past decade and a half of the new millennium has ushered in dramatic changes to the architecture of world trade creating both opportunities and challenges for Africa’s development. The paper is critical of the recent paper of the World Bank that resuscitates the approach to trade liberalization and regional integration propagated by the Washington Consensus. The paper argues that African countries should adopt a “development integration” approach to regional integration that seeks to combine trade liberalization, industrial development and infrastructure development. The paper urges the World Bank and Africa’s trading partners from the north and south, such as the EU, the US and China, to work closely with the African Union to advance the negotiations and implementation of the Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA) and the African Union Agenda 2063.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document